The form of Lima Sopoaga will be vital to Wasps this weekend.
Photograph: David Rogers/Getty Images

Lima Sopoaga is not the first All Black – and will not be the last – to take time to adjust to his new surroundings. Gazing out of the window at the lashing rain whipping across the pitches of Broadstreet RFC is not the vision he was sold when he signed for Wasps as one of English club rugby’s best-paid players. “The sun’ll still come up in the morning,” murmurs the fly-half, trying hard to look on the bright side. “Or a lot of grey anyway.”

Money in European rugby is too good to resist, says Wasps’ Lima Sopoaga

Read more

There is, to be fair, limited glamour to be found on a wet Monday lunchtime on the outskirts of Coventry. When Sopoaga chose to curtail his Test career and seek his fortune on wintry foreign fields he was also unaware he would be joining an underperforming new club. By his own admission, their new figurehead has also been below-par. “Everyone thinks he’s ridden into town on a big white horse and everything’s going to be all right,” sighs Dai Young, his director of rugby. “That hasn’t quite happened.”

These things, of course, are never the fault of one man. Wasps have been disrupted by injuries and international calls, Sopoaga has had assorted different players around him and off-field certainty has also been absent. The prospect of Elliot Daly, Nathan Hughes and Willie le Roux all being at the club next season seems remote and front-row fitness problems have hindered preparations for the first of the club’s back-to-back European games against Toulouse at the Ricoh Arena on Saturday.

In New Zealand I don’t think we watch enough northern hemisphere rugby to truly appreciate it

Lose at home and, as Young concedes, Wasps’ European goose will probably be cooked before Christmas. Having committed to paying Sopoaga a reported £1.5m over two-and-a-half years, it would not be an auspicious start. The 27-year-old has definitely looked happier.

“It’s not that I don’t love this but there are things that do get you down,” he adds, softly. “It’s not all glitz and glamour. A lot of the time people just see the 80 minutes, they don’t see what goes on behind closed doors and how winning and losing can affect players.”

Ask him to elaborate and it all comes tumbling out. “I take it all quite personally. I know when I’ve been playing well and when I haven’t and, at the moment, I’m just not quite there. It’s not through a lack or preparation or not trying my best. I know guys who have come over in different positions who have also found it hard but when you’re such a focal point …”

Lima Sopoaga has arrived at Wasps with the club going through a difficult transition period. Photograph: David Rogers/Getty Images

There is a pause as he reaches for the best analogy. “If I came in as a full-back or a wing all I’d really need to do is know my moves, score tries, run fast and catch high balls. Here I’ve got to play chess and drive the bus. On occasions I’ve felt I’ve driven it well; on others I know I haven’t really nailed it. I feel that deeply and I shoulder a lot of that personally. Dropping balls or kicking out on the full are all things I can control. Coming over as a marquee player adds more pressure but there is no one with greater expectations of me than me.”

His honesty is admirable but the confident match-winner sought by Wasps as a replacement for Danny Cipriani is hard to spot. A proven goal-kicker and deceptive runner, Sopoaga won 16 caps for New Zealand and helped steer the Highlanders to the 2015 Super Rugby title. In Europe, so far, that has counted for frustratingly little. “You’ve just got to realise the way you play in New Zealand isn’t necessarily the best way over here. There’s not a right or wrong way, it’s just different.” How different? “Very. For eight to nine years I was at the Highlanders and I learned a way of thinking I thought was best for me. Here it’s not what they do.”

He used to make the mistake of checking out social media when he endured a lean patch. Nowadays he goes home to his partner Miriam and 14-month-old daughter Milla and counts his blessings.

“When I come home they don’t see Lima Sopoaga the rugby player; they just see their partner or Dad. That’s what keeps driving me every day. If I have a bad day at the office I know that people still love me and I’ve got so much to be grateful for. Sometimes it is just football. It’s just a game.”

You can only hope things ultimately work out for this warm-hearted, thoughtful new arrival, just as they did for Le Roux. Plenty of All Blacks have found it tougher in the northern hemisphere than they anticipated: satisfaction cannot be guaranteed. Nor does big money buy instant happiness, as Sopoaga knew even before he flew north to help provide for his extended family. “It was a big move. Some people have said maybe I should have stayed. But it’s my own life, I get to decide what I want to do. With the All Blacks and the Highlanders I was probably away for four and a half months of the year. For the first nine weeks my daughter was alive I was away for seven of them. That’s another big reason why I moved over here.”

The Breakdown: sign up for our weekly rugby union email.

He has also learned one significant life lesson already: it pays not to underestimate English rugby players. “In New Zealand I don’t think we watch enough northern hemisphere rugby to truly appreciate it. It’s out of sight, out of mind. Because we don’t see it we’re like: ‘Meh, whatever.’ Now, being amongst it, you’ve got some very skilled players and some pretty wicked talent. England have a very decent pack, some electric outside backs and a world-class 10. If you can get a fully-fit England team playing with the mindset they did against the All Blacks last month they’re going to give themselves half a chance.”

This does not mean, naturally, that he is writing off his good friends Ardie Savea, TJ Perenara and Rieko Ioane in Japan next year, despite their November wobbles. “They’ll come back stronger. I’d be 100% confident that black jersey will be a very dangerous beast come the World Cup.”

And Wasps? “I feel the cogs are slowly starting to turn. Once this bus starts to roll I think it’s going to be pretty hard to stop.” Sopoaga has not been an overnight sensation but he is not finished yet.